Background
Norton, Brian was born on December 11, 1955 in Yarmouth, Norfolk, England.
Norton, Brian was born on December 11, 1955 in Yarmouth, Norfolk, England.
Bachelor of Science, U. Nottingham, England, 1977; Master of Science, Cranfield Institute Technology, Bedford, England, 1979; Doctor of Philosophy, Cranfield Institute Technology, Bedford, England, 1983.
Currently he is President of Dublin Institute of Technology (DIT). He is known as a longstanding advocate for reform and diversity of higher education in Ireland. He is also strongly associated with the relocation of DIT from a multiplicity of scattered buildings to a single city centre campus in the Grangegorman neighbourhood of Dublin.
Students have been studying at this new campus since September 2014. He was appointed President of DIT in 2003 and reappointed for a further ten-year term in 2013. In 1989 he was appointed by Sir Derek Birley as the first Professor in the field of the Built Environment at the University of Ulster.
An internationally leading solar energy technology researcher and educator, he is associated particularly with advances in the understanding of the solar dryer, heat transfer in solar energy collectors using Nonimaging optics, very highly insulating glazing and building-integrated photovoltaic systems. His work has been influential in solar water heater design, particularly those using Thermosiphon flow. For the engineering design of thermosiphon solar water heaters, in honour of solar energy technology pioneer John Yellott, he designated a dimensionless quantity characterising performance as the "Yellott Number".
A Fellow of the Irish Academy of Engineering, his awards for contributions to solar energy research include Honorary Fellow of the Chartered Institution of Building Services Engineers, their highest honour. He founded the Centre for Sustainable Technologies, is currently associated with the Dublin Energy Lab and holds Honorary Professorships at University of Ulster and Harbin Institute of Technology.
He currently chairs Action Renewables, is a former chair of the World Renewable Energy Network and a former member of the BRE Trust that owns the UK Building Research Establishment.
M. Bahara Sorooshian, July 24, 1981. 1 child, Pedram.